When William Roy Tompkins Sr. was born in 1905, in Fawn Township, York, Pennsylvania, United States, his father, John Winfield Tompkins, was 24 and his mother, Hannah E., was 23. He married Gladys Olivia King in 1932, in York, Pennsylvania, United States. He died in 2008, in York Hospital, York, York, Pennsylvania, United States, at the age of 103, and was buried in Fawn Grove, York, Pennsylvania, United States.